Zhaohua Li

The evolution of China’s banking system: bank loan announcements 1996–2009

This study investigates China’s evolving banking systems from 1996 to 2009 by testing the market response to bank loan announcements in the China. The results show a significant negative market response to bank loan announcements in the Chinese financial market for the sample period 1996–2004. However, after a series of reforms in the Chinese banking system, the significantly negative market response to bank loan announcements disappears for the sample period 2005–2009.

CEO pay-risk sensitivity, firm policies, and 2009 Australian tax reforms

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of chief executive officer (CEO) vega on firm policies in the Australian share market based on a panel data set drawn from the 137 Australian public firms for the period 2003-2012. Design/methodology/approach To allow mutual causation between our variables, the authors use the two-stage least squares estimation method, controlling for firm fixed effects. The authors use the difference-in-differences model to test whether the 2009 Australian tax reforms may discourage high-vega CEOs to take value-enhancing risks. Findings The authors find the evidence that vega induces CEOs to adopt the riskier financial policy in the Australian capital market. This evidence is further supported by the negative association between vega and firm conservative activities including cash and hedging policies. Further, the result shows that the 2009 tax reforms reduce the CEOs’ willingness to engage in risky financial policy. This finding implies that regulators may restore the 2009 reforms’ “deferred tax point” back to its pre-2009 form. Originality/value Based on the study’s results, firms should grant CEOs more out-of-the money options with a longer time to expiration to offset the 2009 tax reforms’ negative impact on the CEO’s incentive to take value-enhancing risks.

Corporate social responsibility engagement, corporate financial performance and CEO characteristics

The current study examines the effect of corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement on corporate financial performance (CFP). Prior studies document a positive CSR-CFP association without considering the moderating effects of chief executive officer (CEO) characteristics such as compensation incentives and tenure. Our results show evidence of a positive association between CSR and CFP only in the firms managed by short-tenured, high-cash paid CEOs and particularly during an industrys cooling-off period. The results imply that the incentives embedded in the current CEO pay are not effective and CEOs use CSR as a compensation management tool to increase their share-based pay. To encourage a CEO to implement CSR engagement, particularly during an industrys boom period, the board of directors should decrease common-share payments and increase the CEOs option payments. In addition, the proportion of cash compensation in the CEOs total compensation should not be reduced.

An Empirical Investigation on CEOs' Option Incentives and Firms’ Risky Financing Policy: Evidence from Australian Public Companies

In order to align executives’ interests with shareholders’ interests, board of directors has rewarded executives with more option-based payments in the past decades. However, as volatility of share return increases, CEOs are more risk averse because their human capital and wealth are undiversified. Consequently, CEOs may pass up risky but value-enhancing corporate policy decisions. High pay-equity risk sensitivity (vega) CEOs are hypothesised to have more incentive to adopt more risky corporate policy, given that the volatility of the underlying share increases option value in Black-Scholes option pricing model.This study investigates the effect of vega on firm’s book leverage and vega determinants based on a panel data of 137 Australian firms from 2003 to 2012, a period in which the federal government implemented a series of executive pay reforms to tie the pay more closely to performance. The results show that vega has a significant and positive effect on firm’s leverage. In addition, the results demonstrate that there is a negative and statistical significant association between vega and CEOs’ risk-aversion such as the option moneyness and cash compensation. This study also provides evidence that firm size has a significantly positive effect on firms’ debt financing. Furthermore, in-the-money options and executive cash compensation have significant and negative impact on vega.